Ward Method Studies in Colorado
Dr. Alise A. Brown, music educator and teacher of the Ward Method at the University of Northern Colorado — who will also be presenting on the Ward Method at this year’s Sacred Music Colloquium — has kindly allowed the CMAA to make available on-line her 2007 dissertation, The Life of Justine Ward.
The University of North Colorado offers Ward method studies every summer under Dr. Brown’s direction; for information on 2013 offerings, see: Ward Method I and Ward Method II.
The full title of her study is The Life of Justine Ward; her Work in Comparison to Orff and Kodaly; with Applications for the Public School Classroom.
She writes:
Music classrooms today usually include some form of instruction that includes elements of Orff or Kodály methods. The purpose of using these methods is to increase learning. Each of the methods helps provide needed stimulation in one or more areas that will hopefully lead to music literacy. But there is another method, the Ward Method, created by Justine Ward, an American-born woman. The first book of her Catholic Education Series appeared in 1914. Her unique method is based in principles of the Chevé method from France in the 1800s and on Gregorian chant.